


seaside improvisation

by ghostinghearts



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: Hurt/Comfort, M/M, richard siken's poetry will be the death of me
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-12
Updated: 2013-01-12
Packaged: 2017-11-25 05:54:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,591
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/635798
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ghostinghearts/pseuds/ghostinghearts
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Harry is standing in the middle of the sea and he can almost touch the stars and there's nothing but them and the smell of salt in the air and the both of them are anchored down by so much, but it's them, it's Harry-and-Louis and it's messy and unforgiving and bone-achy, but it's theirs.</p><p>(In which Harry and Louis decide to leave everything for a trip to the seaside.)<br/></p>
            </blockquote>





	seaside improvisation

**Author's Note:**

> Thought I should mention the book mentioned is Richard Siken's "Crush." This isn't part of a series per say, but is in a sort of timestamp along "this means it's noon, that means we're inconsolable"
> 
> Title comes from "seaside improvisation" by Richard Siken.

It's Harry's idea to go to the sea. Or really, instead, Louis makes the decision for him, when Harry counts in the underlined phrase of a worn poem and the bags underneath both of their eyes.

 

So maybe it's the both of them. This unquenchable desire for the sea, for sleep, for some sort of escape from their lives, tangled and messy and unnameable.

 

So that's that. Harry makes the decision at 3 AM in the morning. It's the only time it feels like he can breathe, anyway, Louis next to him fast asleep, everything all tangled limbs and the faded electric-blue of soft heartbeats. He picks the only place he can think of, something from a farfetched memory of floating sea foam and orange hued sky.

 

It might be the most irrational thing he's done in a while, but Harry can't find any energy to care anymore.

//

They leave the next morning, quietly, and Harry's at least grateful that the ridiculous amount of money they make means that he can at least do this, buy two plane tickets on his own without really having to think about it. Louis doesn't question it too much, just raises his eyebrows and grumbles a bit when Harry shakes him awake-

 

“Morning, isn't it?,” says Harry quietly, sliding his hands underneath Louis' shirt, searching for the dips in between his ribs. “Mmm,” Louis hums back, scooting closer until he's knee to knee with Harry. Louis opens his eyes slowly and Harry can still make out the laugh wrinkles in the corner of his eyes and the faint blue of his iris under the dim morning light.

 

“Hi,” Louis nearly whispers, his voice still groggy, still heavy with sleep. “Come 'ere.”  
Harry obliges and leans forward to find Louis' lips, still limp with drowsiness. Harry kisses him awake and it's nice, lazy and slow without lust and heat. A bit wet, but sweet and soft all the same.

 

Harry breaks a part a slow two minutes later, with Louis' hands still wrapped around his wrists.  
“Kissing time later, okay? We have to go.”  
Louis mumbles in response, still halfway wrapped around Harry.

 

Harry sighs, but can't help but smile softly. “We'll have plenty of time to cuddle, I just really need you to get up, okay? We have to leave in half an hour.”

Louis opens his eyes again, stretching a bit before sitting up. “Okay, I'm up now. Sufficiently snogged enough to make it through the next hour. Possibly.” Louis tucks his legs on top of Harry's knees and smiles. “Why half an hour?”

 

“Two plane tickets. We leave in two hours. Just me and you,” Harry replies, a little nervous that Louis will find a reason for them not to go.

 

“Harry! Are you whisking me away to a secret island? Something romantic?,” Louis teases playfully, kicking at Harry's arm.

 

Harry rolls his eyes and throws a pillow at Louis. Louis laughs, all light and free and Harry already feels looser than he has in weeks, the knots in his stomach unwinding.

 

Louis pauses for a moment, his face falling. “Are you sure this is okay, though? With Paul and Management and all that? And won't the lads miss us?”

 

“Louis, we're with them bloody all the time. I'm sure they'll be able to survive without us.”

 

Harry frowns a little and bites his lip. He had left messages for all of them, had rambled a bit on Liam's because he knew Liam would need a better explanation than he could give. Harry didn't quite understand why he did it himself. Maybe this was a bad idea, with the new album coming up and press junkets and all that.

 

“Hey.” Louis says softly, sensing Harry's worry, and reaches for Harry's hand to squeeze it. “It's a lovely idea. It's absolutely fine. We're fine.”

//

So they're off. They leave a note on the fridge, (the rest of the boys all have spare keys anyway), and Harry crosses his fingers on takeoff that they won't have to suffer through any major damage control. He thinks of Eleanor and grits his teeth.

 

Surprisingly, Harry remembers exactly where the seaside cottage is once they arrive in Eastbourne.. His family somehow still owns it, a sort of family heirloom passed down for generations. The cottage keeper, a woman named Lucille who looks somewhere in her 60s, somehow doesn't know who they are, or at least doesn't admit it, and hands Harry a set of worn gold keys and a stack of papers.

 

“Pantry's still stocked, you might want to stop by the shop for some essentials. Might see a bit of dust,” says the cottage keeper in a slightly sharp tone. “I can't get to it all the time.” Harry nods at the woman, appreciating her honesty.

 

She pauses for a moment before leaving. “I remember you, you know. All charm and sweetness, even at such a young age.” She smiles a little to herself before shutting the door behind her, leaving them in the midst of dust mites and faded hardwood.

 

“She was rather sweet, don't you think? In a stern but knowing sort of way, you know. Almost Grandomother-ly.” Louis adds after a still moment. “Nice that she didn't make a fuss about you. I'm actually surprised she didn't ask for a kiss, I thought things were going to get a bit cheeky. You know, with you and older woman and all that.”

 

Harry laughs, and the feeling of lightness comes back again. “The Sun has been lacking in rumors, lately. Not sure how they'd feel about that, though, me and Lucille the Cottage Keeper. And besides. I'm already taken.”

 

Louis, surprisingly, blushes, his cheeks turning a soft pink and Harry can't help but feel a bit proud of himself.

 

It'll be good, he thinks: just the two of them and the sea.

//

They spend the rest of the day exploring the depths of the cottage, (it's more of Louis discovering and Harry getting re-acquainted), homey with its faded oak hardwood flooring covered with thick wool rugs and mantled fireplaces. It's not very big but somehow exploring turns into hours of Harry telling Louis stories from past holidays, how afterward everything would smell like the sea, saltwater and wood seeping through his bones.

 

It's nice, Harry thinks, the simplicity of the both of them, sitting cross-legged in the middle of a carpeted bedroom. Harry finds himself saying he wants to go everywhere with Louis, or at least back to the places they've been, just the two of them. They invent stories, their story in a hundred different versions and alternate universes. The things they could have done. Two other people they could have been.

 

Somewhere along the way, the day leaves them. Morning turns into daytime and daytime into nearly dusk, making everything softly hued and leaving shadows in every corner. Harry forgets where they spend most of their time, but in every room Louis leaves marks on his skin, soft imprints that serve as a map.

 

(There, in the kitchen, the counter top, an open window overlooking a garden, Louis humming lovely into his neck, soft and slow.)

//

“We still haven't gone to the beach,” Harry announces suddenly, a few hours later while they lie on their backs in the living room, both of them full on fettuccine alfredo and the feeling of happiness. Louis murmurs back softly, eyes closed and eyelashes tracing shadows on his cheeks.

 

“Louis,” says Harry, nudging Louis' foot carefully. No reply.

 

“Lou? Lou?” Still none.

 

“Kev--”

 

“Don't you dare say it! Nope!,” and Louis springs up, covering Harry's mouth with his hands. Harry bites back quite cheekily, smiling into his palm. Louis gives him a look before letting go. His hair is ruffled and he looks sleepy, but happy, there's a bit of pasta sauce on his shirt, and Harry doesn't think he's felt so much fondness for another person in his entire life.

 

(Louis is ridiculous, he's bright, he's tinted gold, and Harry loves him.)

 

“Okay, then, love. Off we go!”

 

Harry does a victory cheer before racing to the doorway. It's nearly black outside, and it's eerily-quiet. There's a radio playing somewhere from inside the cottage, something French and jazzy and slow. (Harry doesn't remember turning it on, the moment lost somewhere in between chaste kisses and Louis saying his name and pasta boiling over on a pot). There isn't a single soul and it feels foreign to Harry, this place without screaming fans and headaches and too many demands. Harry wouldn't trade his life for anything, it has given him Louis and three other wonderful people and a hundred mind-boggling moments after all. But sometimes it feels like Too Much, like Harry's a string on the verge of breaking loose.

 

Louis comes up behind him, soft and tender, quietly. Quiet Louis is different from all the other Louis', it's the one that Harry has to wrap his head around. Reach for to know that the both of them are still breathing.

 

“You're happy, right?” Louis whispers, so softly that Harry almost doesn't hear him. Harry turns around to face Louis. It's so dark that Harry can't really see him, would have to trace his figure with his fingertips. Harry does, just for the reassurance, and he hopes it's enough.

 

(Because there is more than one way to say I Love You, You Make Me Happy and I Love You is Louis in the morning and Louis crying in front of Harry for the first time and Louis tracing circles onto his ribcage in the middle of the night when the both of them can't sleep out of heaviness and the first time they made love, Louis shouting his name like a prayer into the air and  
coming back down one last  
time to plant a kiss on Harry's forehead, still shaking)

 

Harry is standing in the middle of the sea and he can almost touch the stars and  
there's nothing but them and the smell of salt in the air and the both of them are anchored down by so much, but it's them, it's Harry-and-Louis and it's messy and unforgiving and bone-achy,  
but it's theirs.

 

And Harry doesn't remember when they started dancing, but Louis is so close to him and his eyes are still shining despite the dark and everything is  
“que tu m'aimais encore, serais ce possible alors.”

//

The problem is, they're not as careful, now. It was easy when everything was jumbled and new, tangled in all the Best Ways, bright-red lust coursing through their veins. Before everything got scary and magnified.

 

Now? It's different. It's heavier, it's the stones in Harry's stomach that threaten to keep sinking. It's waking up in the middle of the night hoping bits of Louis didn't fade while they slept. It's scary, loving someone this much, saying here, I'm giving you my heart and I don't know if it's good enough, but I'm trying and I hope that's enough.

 

Harry desperately wants it to be enough. It scares him how important it's become to him, how sometimes it feels like they could break after one fall. It's tentative and crystallized and they aren't invincible anymore, they aren't tied by Fate or any other form of luck, no invisible string tying them together and it's scary how real it's become, how much Harry would be willing to give up to keep even some form of them.

 

It's not perfect and it's complicated and far from black and white. They had to jump hurdles to get to where they are now.

 

No one told you that love slips into your skin when you're sleeping and leaves traces. No one tells you how how much you burn with it, how it diffuses into your bloodstream no matter how hard you try to stamp it out of your skin.

//

Everything is the blue and greens of the sea. Faded yellows. The both of them brighter-

 

It's the faded bathtub with the clawed feet and cracked black and white tiles. Something out of a time period movie, Louis says fondly before climbing in, still fully clothed. The two of them knee to knee in the bathtub. Silent except for the tick of a watch and drip of a faucet. Harry accidentally nudging the faucet open. A pain in a side from the fullness of laughter. Milky-white water eventually reaching up to their knees.

 

Harry thinks he'll remember the quiet moments the most. The moment after they stripped their wet clothing off, the both of them pale and shivering. Louis is all he can remembers, he doesn't think he'll be able to erase the blue-of-love off his skin, diluted pupils and red marks tracing a collarbone. The yellow-green-blue of a blooming bruise, there. (A tender bruise of love they are, carefully placed but messy all the same. Something out of hurry. Impatience. Not enough time to wait.) The way the golden hour lit up Louis' eyelashes before he leaned in- not enough time, never enough time.

//

He remembers “We'll make our own stories. We'll leave our own marks.”

//

Harry wakes up one morning to his phone vibrating and slips out of bed, careful not to disturb Louis. Louis is fast asleep, sheets curled messily around his waist and hand reaching out to the spot where Harry slept. He looks slightly ridiculous, mouth agape and hair tussled.

 

Harry pulls on a cable-knit sweater on his way out the cottage. It's a little after dawn and chilly, the sun still a faded pink-orange and a slight wind raises the hair on Harry's arms. Harry plops down in the sand and answers.

 

“Took you long enough, mate. Was beginning to think you two had disappeared on me.”

 

“Surprised you're up this early.” Waking up before ten was a rarity for Zayn. You had to fight for a good ten minutes to get him to get just lift up his head.

 

“Ah, well you know, Liam keeps texting me these life motivational quotes 'n stuff, “early bird catches the worm” and all that, innit. 'Cept it's really more like “early bird ctchs the wrm and ur the bird zayn!!!! Too many bloody exclamation points, if you ask me.”

 

Harry laughs loudly, and he's surprised how much he misses him already, all of them, even Zayn with his mood swings and Niall's constant jumping and Liam's tendency to ramble about fruits.

 

“Anyway, how's everything with you two? How's it up in Eastbourne?”

 

“Great, actually. Super lovely.” Harry pauses for a moment. “Didn't know how much we needed it until we were here. It's no one for miles. Takes a bit of getting used to. Bit weird without the screaming girls.”

“Mmm. Must be nice, though,” Zayn says absentmindedly.

 

Zayn hums and it's silent for a while.

 

(That was one of the really nice things about Zayn: he listened. Left room, left space for you to feel comfortable and breathe. The rest of the boys were all nice to talk to (and with Liam it was a lot of rambling), but Zayn seemed to know how much quiet was enough.)

“You know, I know I don't say this because, well, I figure it's a given, but you know that I'm here no matter what, right? And I'm really happy for you and Lou, whatever you guys are because it shouldn't be labeled and defined and I don't know what happened exactly when things were heavy between you two, but I'm so grateful, mate. For the both of you, this thing that all of us have. All of it, mate, the late nights and early mornings and even the crazy shit, too. Just want you to know. I wouldn't take it back, none of it.” Zayn pauses for a second before continuing.

 

“That week in the bungalow... I remember it felt so important and different and I felt like I had met my best mates for life. Brothers even. How often does that happen, Harry? And for you and Lou, for you two to meet and happen. I just... it's lovely that you two have that.”

 

(Harry stays quiet, knowing that this is important, that after he'll want this etched into his memory, Zayn's careful words.)

 

“And I've never told anyone this, 'cept maybe Liam, because, well, it's Liam, but I wish I had that, y'know? Just seems so nice, to have something that seems so simple? It's probably not simple to the two of you, but, all the same.” Zayn clears his throat and Harry almost feels like crying, knowing that if they were having this conversation in person, Harry would be the one giving him a hug. Serious talks like these (and they had their fair share of them) tended to wear the both of them out.

 

“Thanks, mate. Really means a lot.” Harry pauses before continuing.

 

“I never told you this, but, I used to take your cigarettes when you weren't looking? For a while, three weeks I think. I'd steal 'em and stuff while you'd smoke on hotel balconies on tours. Didn't smoke them or anythin', Liam would've had a heart attack, but I'd keep them. In my pockets and stuff. Didn't really know what to do with them. It just felt like something I needed to do when things were a bit hard.

 

“Yeah, when you carried around that book of poems all the time? By Richard something? I noticed, though, I didn't want to say anything. I figured you would tell me if you needed to. Figured it had something to do with you and Louis.”

 

“Yeah, it was just.. I was so scared? Everything had been moving so fast but so slow at the same time and I just didn't know, I didn't know where we were, Louis and I, everything was weird and heavy, I just-”

 

Harry breaks off, not knowing where to finish. He doesn't think he'll be able to explain, not properly, anyhow.

 

“'S okay love.” murmurs Zayn. “Harry, some things don't need an explanation.”

//

Harry sits by the sea for a while longer, tracing words into the sand with his fingers. It's warmer now, sun nearly above his head and the lull of the water is calming. Harry hears the swing of a door and Louis steps out, settling next to Harry.

 

“Missed you. Felt like you were gone for hours or something.”

 

“You were sleeping, though? How can you miss me when you're asleep?” Harry smiles, though, and pulls Louis in for a kiss.

“It's very, very possible.”

 

It's quiet for a moment.

 

“Zayn called.”

 

“Ah, how is our brooding babe?”

 

“Good. Says he misses you, though. Us. And the rest of the boys as well.”

 

Louis leans in to place his head on Harry's shoulder and sighs. “Told you they'd miss us too much. Don't know how it's possible that I miss them so much already, but I do.”

 

It's quiet and Louis traces invisible patterns and words onto Harry's wrist.

 

“Anyway, I'm hungry. And you're the best at breakfast. Plus we haven't had sex in about thirteen hours.”

 

“Actually it's been-”

“Okay, eight! Bloody ridiculous, you are! Can't give myself a blowjob, can I, now?”

 

Harry laughs, hard, and nearly face-plants into the sand. “You're an idiot, y'know that? ”

 

“It's the truth,” huffs Louis. “It's a right pain in the arse sometimes.”

 

Harry bites his lip and tries not to laugh. “Anyway.”

 

“Anyway.”

 

Harry stands up to walk towards Louis and kisses him again, rough this time. “Okay.”

//

On the last evening, Harry digs out the book of the poems out of his suitcase while Louis is in the bathroom. It's hidden under mismatched socks and an extra wool jumper. A backup. He hides it under his pillow before Louis comes to bed, sliding gently underneath the covers, coming close enough to place his lips on Harry's forehead.

 

“What's that under the pillow, love?” Louis whispers onto Harry's skin, and he can feel Louis' eyelashes against his skin. Moth wings, Harry thinks somewhere in the back of his mind. Louis reaches underneath the pillow and tugs it loose, out from under them. A surrender in the middle of limbs and sheets.

 

It's there in-between them, and they stare at it for a while, not willing to speak its name.

 

“Crush,” Louis says first, quietly, tracing its spine. His eyes find Harry's and Harry can already feel the question forming behind his lips.

 

“I just... I don't know, it felt weird not bringing it? I was just going to read it after you fell asleep. Not the whole thing.” Harry feels weird admitting it, like it's a betrayal.

 

Louis frowns slightly. “It's too sad, ” and Louis pauses before continuing, something unreadable in his eyes. “We're not them, that's not us, Harry-”

 

“-I know. I know. I just... need to know there's a happy ending. I need to know that this doesn't end with us drowning.”

 

Louis breathes in sharply, after Harry finishes. He tries to smile but it's shaky and something is anchoring them down, Harry can feel it somewhere. Underneath the bed maybe. In between the pages. Already lost and invisible in the mattress. Louis looks so scared, so careful at the same time. It's almost dark and there are shadows in the corner and Harry doesn't know if they are theirs anymore. Harry looks away.

 

“No,” Louis says, reaching for Harry. (When did there become space in between them, isn't that what they were fighting the whole time?)

 

“No.”

 

“It doesn't.”

 

And somehow, that's enough.

**Author's Note:**

> please note that i have virtually no knowledge regarding places in the UK, so if Eastbourne isn't really a seaside town in the UK, sorry about that.


End file.
